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Ranbaung, sixth of the dynasty established at Tharekhet-ta-ra, reigned fifty years (from 193 to 243 Era of Religion). In Crawfurd's Journal of an Embassy to the Court of Ava, Appendix viii., a Burmese chronological table dates Ram- b'haong. King of Prome, B.C. 351. 3 SuvANNABHtJMi see E. Forchhammer's Notes on the INTRODUCTION. 13 YoNAKARAXTHA is the country of the Yavana people or Jan-May ' (the country of the ShAn tribes about Ziimn6). The identification of Pannasaiui is one to be met with oomraouly in the works of Burmese writers, according to whom Yofia is the ShAn country about Chieng-Mai (Taw Sein Ko, liemarks, Ac; Forchhainmer, Early History, Sco.). European authorities have unanimously placed Yonaka in the N. W. region of India invaded and lield by the Greeks (see, among others, Rhys Davids, Buddhism, p. 227 ; Sylvain LAvi, La Orice et flnde, p. 37 ; Max Doncker, Guekiehie der drier, p. 378). In the chapter on Yonakara^tha the author of the S&sauavamsa localises the Yonaka country more exactly, mentioning the countries Harihhuhja, Kamboja, Khema- vara, and Ayuddha, also the cities of Sokkataya and Kapunna. From these hints we may gather that his Yonaka country extends along the valleys of the Me-nam and Me-ping rivers and includes the ShAn States to the north of these. The names Kamphaung and ZinrnU (on the Meping) Thukkate and Yuthia (on the Me-nam) can be easily recognised under their pseudo-Pali forms. Early History and Geography of British Burma. The first Buddhist Mission to StivannabhUmi ; Taw Sein Ko, Preliminary Study of the Kalyani Inscriptions {Ind. Ant. vol. xxii. p. 17) explains Sudhammanagara as the modem That6n in the Amhurst district. Phajore {Hist, Bur. p. 19) describes Suiidmahhiimi as including the delta of the Irawadi and Thahtun (being the capital) see also op. c*^p. 24, for references to Lassen, Yule, and Bp. Bigandet on Suvannabhumi. The chapter on Suvannabhumi touches briefly on Religion in Muttima (Martaban) as a part of Bamanna. The history of this region is only carried on to the year 1478 A.D. (reign of the celebrated King Dhammaceti.) I YoNAKARATTHA (The Jail-May of the Pali MSS. of this work, is usually transcribed Zimme or Chieng-Mai). 14 INTBODUCTION. With regard to the Yavana people, it may further be noted that in the sketch map of the ancient classical divisions of ludo-China, in Lucien Fournereau's Le Siam Ancien {Annates du MusSe Guimet, Tome 27) Yavanade^a lies to the east of the Me-ping Kiver. For the Yavana people in Indo-China see also Abel Bergaigne's U ancien Boyaume de Gampd d'apr^s les Inscriptions, p. 61, and MSmoires et documents de la Mission Pavie, p. 3. The ancient Haripu7iya is identified by M. Fournereau with Lamphun (Siam Ancien, p. 53). M. Pavie says, describing a Thai inscription at Lamphun, " Ce Hari- punjapura fut dans le haut Laos la station la plus reculee vers la frontiers de la Chine, et sans donte nous avons la la capitale du Yavanadeqa qui du temps de la colonisation brahmanique comprenait la contr6e du haut Mekhong, probablement toute le partie longeant la frontifere de la Chine entre Chieng Mai et le Ton-king" (MSmoires et documents de la Mission Pavie (ed. M. Pavie et P. Lefevre Pontalis), p. 144. In the Po" U'o Daung Inscription near Prome (ed. Taw Sein Ko, Ind. Ant., vol. xxii. p. 1, et seq) the following states of the then Burmese kingdom are mentioned among others — Kamboja (including Mone, Nyangwe, Thibo and Alomeik), A^uttaya (including Dvaravati (Bangkok) Yodaya (Ayuthia) and Kamanpaik). Khemavara, is the region including Kaington and Kyaing Kaung. It lies between the Saliwen and Me-kong rivers. (See also F. Garnier, Voyage d' exploration en Indo- Chine, p. 366 ; and Yule, Mission to the Court of Ava, p. 352.) Vanavasi ^ (on which Western opinion has been divided) I Vanavasi. Some opinions on Vanavasi may be cited : — Childers (Pali Diet, s.v.) explains Vanavaso : " Name of a country. According to Vijesimiha it means Thibet." Ehys Davids says (Buddhism, p. 227), "Vanavasi, that ^1 INTRODUCTION. M* J is the region round Prome. In support of this explaoftf^ tion the author mentions that an ancient image of the Buddha was found near Prome some years ago, the inscription of which says that it was erected for the homage of the people of VanavUsi. Of Kasmira-Gandhara it is only said that these two countries formed part of one kingdom [i.e., that of A9oka ] at the time of the Missions, Mahimsakamandala is (in agreement with other writers) identified as the Andhaka — or Andhra — country.' CiNARATTHA, in the Mutiha of the Sasanavamsa, takes the place of the Himavantapadesa of the Ceylon books. is the wilderness. It surely cannot mean Thibet. . . . perhaps it wm on the borders of the great desert in liajputana." Fergusson and Burgess (quoted by Taw Sein Ko in Ind. Ant., vol. xxiii. p. 103) place Vanavasi in Kanara (see Cave Temples of India, p. 17) and Koppen (Beligion des Buddha, vol. i. pp. 195, 196) conjectures it to be " im Sudosten des heutigen Goa." * Kasmira-Gandhara. The Gandhara country lay on the right bank of the Indus, south of Cabul (Max Duncker, Geschichte der Arier, p. 273). = Mahimsakamandala : Cf . the following : — " Mahisamandala worunter man vermuthet Mahismat oder Mahlsvara au der mitteren Nerbudda zu verstehen ist " (Koppen, Bel. des Buddh., vol. i. p. 195). Mahisa, " the most southerly settlement of the Aryans South of the Godavari, in the Nizam's dominions" (Eh. Davids, Buddhism, p. 227, quoting Lassen's Indische Alterthumskunde, i. 681). Mahisamandala; Maisur (Fergusson and Burgess, Cave Temples of India, p. 17). (Burma has its own Mahimsakamatidala, a district, 16 INTEODUCTION. Himavantapadesa, mentioned in our text as forming one region with Cinarattha, has been identified with the Central Himalayas (Rh. Davids, Buddhism, p. 227), and with Nep4l (Fergusson and Burgess, Cave Temples, p. 17). The Sen, or Chinarattha, of the Po" Uo Daung Inscription is the borderland to the N.E. of Burma {i.e., includes the districts of Bhamo and Kaungsin, the district bordering on the Chinese province Yunnan). But in Chapter X. of the Sasanavamsa, " On Religion in Cina- rattha," we read that the ruler of Cina at one time ruled over Kasmlra-Gandhara, though at the time of Majjhima's mission the latter countries did not form part of his domain. Kasmlra-Gandhara did as a matter of fact become part of the great kingdom of the Mauryas in the time of A9oka (Max Duncker, Geschichte der Arier, pp. 275, 374), but at a later period war was waged between China and a rival power over these North- West provinces (Sylvain L6vi, Notes sur les Indo-Sct/thes, p. 62). Maharattha is Mahanagararattha, or Siam. Maharattha is considered by a number of European scholars to be the region of the Upper Godavari, that is, the country of the Maharastras (see E. Miiller, Journal of the Pali Text Society, 1888; also Rh. Davids, Buddhism, p. 227; Koppen, Bel. Buddh., pp. 195, 196; Fergusson and Burgess, Cave Temples, p. 17). Childers, however, explains Maharattha as Siam. The author of the Sasanavamsa explains that his Maharattha or Mahanagararattha borders on Siam. From this observation and one or two others occurring in the chapter on Maharattha, it would seem that the mentioned in the Po°o TJl Daung Inscription, including Mogok and Kyatpyin). It should be mentioned here that the name of the missionary to Mahimsaka is Maharevata in Sas. V. Mahadeva in Dlpa V., Maha. V., Suttav., Saddh. Samy., and Sam. Pas. INTRODUCTION. 17 country in question is Laos. An interesting if slight allusion is made to the Brahmanic cult 'prevailing there at the time of the Mission {aggihutadiniicchdkamniam yebhuyyena akarpau). Nagasena is mentioned as preach- ing in this region. (For N&gasena in Laotian legend see Francis Gamier, Voyage d' exploration, pp. 248, 251. This author learnt that, in Siamese tradition, Laos is a Holy Land.) {Op. cit., p. 100.) I should add that an inscription of the seventeenth century, quoted by Burmese diplomatists in negotiation with the British Government and translated for his Government by Colonel Burney (Resident at Ava, 1837), thus defines the region Mahatutgara, "All within the great districts of Kyain-youn and Mamgeen " (Yule, Mission to the Court of Ava, p. 351). Finally, Aparantarattha (placed by European scholars west of the Punjab), is none other than the Sunaparanta of the Biurmese, i.e., the region lying west of the Upper Irawaddy.